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I am prepared to work until I am seventy. Based on family history I should then be able to enjoy 20 good years of retirement before I start to lose it physically, mentally, or both. My parents are both very active doing landscaping for themselves, neighbors, and their church among other things. My grandparents and great-grandparents also stayed strong and active through their eighties.

considering how bad some of the jobs are out there that alas I must consider I think if i was 62 now I'd collect now. Because really jobs that make you grit your teeth to even have to consider. But since I'm not 62 I must do what people with no other income (savings some but not income) but temporary unemployment do - which is desperately seek work.

If you want something to get done, ask a busy person. If you want them to have a nervous breakdown that is.

I personally hope to be able to work until 60 (ten more years) but then retire while I hopefully still have many years of active enjoyable life ahead of me. The last thing I want to do is end up like a good friend of my father. He retired in his early 60's and on Saturday morning, the day after his last day, he was cleaning out the gutters on his house, fell off the ladder and cracked his head wide open. Never even collected a single pension check. Yes, that could happen at any age, even before retirement, but it was a harsh reminder which I've never forgotten that no one knows what tomorrow will bring. I'd like to be in the "die broke" category and don't intend to work any longer than I need to to have a realistic shot of being in that category.

I personally hope to be able to work until 60 (ten more years) but then retire while I hopefully still have many years of active enjoyable life ahead of me. The last thing I want to do is end up like a good friend of my father. He retired in his early 60's and on Saturday morning, the day after his last day, he was cleaning out the gutters on his house, fell off the ladder and cracked his head wide open. Never even collected a single pension check. Yes, that could happen at any age, even before retirement, but it was a harsh reminder which I've never forgotten that no one knows what tomorrow will bring. I'd like to be in the "die broke" category and don't intend to work any longer than I need to to have a realistic shot of being in that category.

I worked with a good man who retired and died the next day at breakfast. He was such a responsible person that I figure he was just holding on until he had fulfilled his obligation to the company. I took my SS at 62.

I worked with a good man who retired and died the next day at breakfast. He was such a responsible person that I figure he was just holding on until he had fulfilled his obligation to the company. I took my SS at 62.

Everybody has their story about the guy dying on his first day of retirement. For me, the lesson is not so much to quit working as soon as possible so much as to gravitate toward work that isnít so awful that you look at retirement as a sort of salvation you can be robbed of by dying too soon.

I retired with a pension at age 49. I applied for SS at 62 and as my husband is still employed and we have my pension, I put my SS into our saving account. My reasons for applying at 62 was not financial or the fact that I may die tonight but simply because I wanted to.

I was fortunate enough to pick and train for a career I loved. I didn’t always love the people in charge but loved the work. My poor MIL also died right after retiring. She had trips planned she never got to take.

Everybody has their story about the guy dying on his first day of retirement. For me, the lesson is not so much to quit working as soon as possible so much as to gravitate toward work that isn’t so awful that you look at retirement as a sort of salvation you can be robbed of by dying too soon.

+1

I do think it's a weird phenomenon. I happen to know of three of them. And my take-away was that for some people, retirement, to your body, might be just like when you get a cold as soon as you go on vacation. I really believe that when you have a driving purpose, your body responds by doing what it can to stay healthy.

"Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it--every, every minute?" Emily Webb, Our Townwww.silententry.wordpress.com

I "retired" when I was 36, since then most years I have had no contributions, or very minimal ones from the small amounts paid for some of my public service positions, so while my contributions during my peak years were huge, I'm wondering if I'll get anything at all.